Mario Venzago - Conductor

Mario Venzago is the principal conductor and artistic director of the Bern Symphony Orchestra and Artist in Association at Finland's Tapiola Sinfonietta.

In the capacity either of principal conductor or general music director, Mario Venzago has directed the Musikkollegium Winterthur, the Theatre and Philharmonic Orchestra of the City of Heidelberg, The Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Frankfurt (now Bremen), the Graz Opera and Graz Philharmonic Orchestra, the Basel Symphony Orchestra, the Basque National Orchestra in San Sebastian, the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. From 2000 to 2003, he was Artistic Director of the Baltimore Summer Fest as successor to Pinchas Zukermann and David Zinman. From 2010 to 2014 he was principal conductor of the Royal Northern Sinfonia.

Before taking up conducting, Venzago was a concert pianist at Radiotelevisione Svizerra in Switzerland, and performed throughout Europe as a soloist and accompanist.

Mario Venzago has conducted the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the orchestras in Philadelphia and Boston, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the Filarmonica della Scala and the NHK Symphony Orchestra. He is a regular guest conductor with internationally renowned symphony orchestras such as the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Danish National Symphony Orchestra, the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, and prestigious chamber orchestras including the Tapiola Sinfonietta and the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne.

Mario Venzago has given concerts with the world's most famous soloists, and worked together with directors such as Ruth Berghaus, Peter Konwitschny and Hans Neuenfels.

Several of his CDs have won international prizes such as the Grand Prix du Disque, the Diapason d'or and the Edison Award. His recordings of the operas “Venus” and “Penthesilea” and of all choral works by Othmar Schoeck with the MDR choir and symphony orchestra received great international recognition and prestigious awards, as did his first film, “My Brother the Conductor” by Alberto Venzago, which was shown in cinemas across Europe and brought out on DVD. In the spring of 2015, the collaboration between Mario Venzago and the label CPO on the project “The Other Bruckner,” with all ten Bruckner symphonies, was completed. The individual releases, acclaimed by international critics, are available from CPO (www.jpc.de), as are the complete CD box and a documentary film.

Season 2015/16/17

Please use only the latest biography. Changes may only be made after consultation with freitag artists.